Off the Streets® — Cincinnati Union Bethel

Molly McDonough, Summer 2014

When we think about the qualities that make a good physician, we often forget about the subtleties and nuances that are an essential component of quality patient care. My UHP internship offered me a chance to practice some of those skills outside of the clinical setting. I got to practice building trust with new people, I got to practice creating a warm environment conducive to sharing, and I got to practice reacting with compassion and warmth when people were at their most vulnerable. While these are skills that we discuss as being essential to patient care, the moments when we actually get to do these things are few and far between, especially in the early years of our training.

Off the Streets (OTS) is a program structured around the idea that empowerment is the most sustainable means to recovery for women who experience chemical dependency and who have prostituted in the past. The women in the program are provided with a safe place to live, access to medical services, and group sessions where they explore the behaviors of their past and work to develop confidence and self-esteem for the future.

For my project, I worked with the women to develop a comprehensive wellness course that encompassed nutrition, fitness, and recreational activities. Teaching the women about the basic aspects of healthy living including knowing the food groups, reading nutrition labels, and shopping on a limited budget has been an extremely positive experience for all of us. Reviewing this material for the women helped me to realize that there are many aspects of healthy living that I need to take time to discuss with my future patients. For example, nutrition labels are something that I often use as a tool to help me shop at the store, but after facilitating a group on how to use them to make healthier choices, I realized that these labels actually aren’t very intuitive to use for many people.

This summer, the women at OTS opened up to me and shared some of their experiences from living on the streets. These stories were gut wrenching and heart breaking, but a common theme with the women was that this program has given them the opportunity to put all of that in the past. They now feel confident looking people in the eye and walking down the street with their head held high because, truthfully speaking, no one knows anything about their past unless they share that information. To see such a remarkable transformation in these women has been an incredible experience for me this summer. Throughout this journey we experienced personal growth together, and I am so grateful for the new friendships I’ve formed with them.

For me, working at Off the Streets was a profound and unique opportunity to see what we can do when we rally behind our sisters and friends and empower them to be their own advocates. Through this process I’ve learned how to take an active role in that journey by replacing stigma with respect and love.